


Ten Years in the Making

by Magdalane



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Christmas Cookies, Christmas Party, F/M, Fluff, marriage trope, proposal, so short
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-17
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-14 21:22:36
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,746
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28802022
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Magdalane/pseuds/Magdalane
Summary: Micro fic based on a twitter moodboard/prompt:  https://twitter.com/TheVintageReylo/status/1350274735406538754
Relationships: Kylo Ren/Rey, Rey & Ben Solo | Kylo Ren, Rey/Ben Solo
Comments: 13
Kudos: 89





	1. Chapter 1

He could feel the weight of the ring in his pocket.

He had no idea what his father had been thinking, giving it to him.

All his strange talking about how he thought he might not be around much longer to give it to him by the time Ben finds someone to give a ring to…

It had Ben on edge. But maybe it was just that he was 38 now, and showing no signs of giving his parents any more grandbabies.

His mother, ever polished, had seemed more avoidant of any real conversation than usual earlier in the day. 

She was warm, and hugged him, and moved about airily getting ready for her annual holiday party as she always did, of course. 

He had come to accept his parent’s odd duality; loving and warm, but they sometimes felt superficial. They never told him anything of any gravity, and now his dad is giving him his grandmother’s engagement ring, and saying he doesn't want to miss out on a chance to give it to him one day.

Ben sighs. Whatever that means.

He takes a slow swig of his drink and looks around.

His mother is smiling and laughing with some of their old friends. People Ben has known since he was a child. His father is outside, just beyond the glass paned patio doors, possibly talking about cars, with his uncle Chewie.

His eyes, finally, settle on just about the only person in attendance close to his age, even if she is ten years younger. She’s coming up to him now; dressed in a green glittery dress and he wonders how it is that she looks more beautiful every year he sees her.

“I was wondering where you were,” she opens. “I was afraid I’d miss you.”

He smiles slightly.

“Of course not. I was just talking to Han for a bit.”

Her knowing eyes appraise him. She might as well have been a part of the family for as well as she knew how to read them. 

“I’ll never stop thinking it’s weird you call him Han instead of ‘Dad’.”

She sidles up next to him, so that they are both looking out at the large room full of guests, but not before grabbing an impeccably festive sugar cookie to nibble on.

“And I’ll never really care,” he says back.

She smiles.

He feels the weight of the ring again, and he wonders why… after ten years of her being a part of his mother’s inner circle, he never asked her out.

Why… why  _ is _ it that he only sees her once in a year, aside from random sightings if he visits his mother at work. Why is that, he wonders, when she makes everything feel lighter. He thinks briefly back on his failed relationships. ‘Not  _ failed _ , just not right’, his mother’s voice echoes in his head. She means to make him feel better, but it doesn’t really work. It makes him feel like he has to say things in a prettier way to make  _ her _ think he hasn’t failed.

He’s probably too cynical.

He doesn’t think the woman standing next to him has a cynical bone in her body.

“Do you…” he hesitates, and she prompts him to continue, looking naive and open.

“Do you remember our first party here, together? When you’d only just begun working for Leia?”

She looks thoughtful.

“Yes, of course I do. I thought you were the most handsome man in the room,” she teases, as if keeping her tone light wouldn’t make his heart speed up.

“Do you remember what we said?”

“No….?”

“You were a bit lonely then, weren’t you?”

Her bubbly demeanor changes.

“Well, yes. Did we… talk about something in particular?” she asks carefully. Too carefully.

“You thought I was old, remember? You said by the time  _ you _ were 28 you’d be married or have kids if you weren’t still working for my mother. You couldn’t believe someone like me didn’t have that yet. You seemed to think we had everything.”

She laughs.

“Well, you did have everything.”

“Except love, right?” he chuckles.

Suddenly she had no response, and he sipped his drink while she reached behind her for another cookie.

“Did I… did I make you feel bad? I remember some of what was said, but not all.”

“Me? No, of course not. I don’t care. My parents care, it would seem, about my age and the fact that I haven’t settled down.” He fingered the box in his pocket. “I just thought it was tragically sad that an 18-year-old girl who just landed an amazing internship right out of highschool was worried about kids and marriage.”

She glared at him.

“I wasn’t  _ really _ worried about marriage. Or kids. Maybe I said that--- But it was really just about love, like you said. Maybe… family, but in a broader sense.”

“So, do you remember what I said after that?”

He was dying for her to get there, but maybe she’d forgotten.

“Ten years ago? Do you remember what we said, ten years ago?”

She glared at him again.

“Yes, I remember. I was a kid, Ben.” She seemed irritated for some reason.

“But you aren’t a kid anymore. And I’m definitely not any younger.”

“What are you suggesting?” she scoffed, but her cheeks tinged pink. 

“I think we should do it.”

“You’re utterly ridiculous.”

“Probably.”

She chewed on her lip, and turned fully to him.

“If you are going to suggest we fulfill pseudo-pact, from a casual conversation over a decade ago, I expect you to at least quit dancing around it and just say the words.”

He smirked at her. He wasn’t entirely sure what he was thinking, but he knew he’d not found anyone in ten years that made his heartbeat speed up like hers did, and he knew he was done casually dating, too. He got nothing out of it, except for the fun of a few dates that ended well, and he was ready for something… less superficial.

He wished, however, that he’d had a camera on her face the moment he pulled an  _ actual _ engagement ring out of his pocket.

He held the box in the flat of his palm, looking down at her as her face went pale.

“My dad gave me this today, of all days. The day I’d see you. The day ten years after we had the ridiculous idea that if we weren’t married in ten years, we’d just marry each other and be done with it. Well, it turns out I do feel done with it. I am ready for something else. And I’ve always wanted to see you more. Always.”

“What the hell are you doing?” she hissed.

“This is what I propose,” he continued, unruffled. “I will take you out tomorrow, and maybe the next day too. We’ll spend January having as many dates as we can. And on Valentine’s Day, I’ll give you this, and you’ll give me an honest answer based on the 6 weeks or so we’ve spent getting to know each other.”

His eyes sparkled, and she reached for the box to see what it held inside, but he snatched it away.

“Ah ah ah,” he said, indicating he wouldn’t be showing her the ring. “On Valentine’s Day. If we want it. What do you say?”

She reached out her hand, as if they were doing business together.

“It’s a deal.”


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The First Date.

Rey didn’t think she had felt this many butterflies moving around in her stomach since she’d been up for a promotion at work, and had been forced to give a presentation to an associate of Leia's named Hux. He scared the crap out of her, and everybody else she knew except Leia, with his sour expressions and sharp tongue. She’d won him over, working hard to shove her imposter syndrome aside, and secured the promotion.

This was just a date.  _ Surely _ it called for less nerves than that day.

Her stomach didn’t agree.

How could she be  _ this _ nervous? It wasn’t like this was the son of her idol and mentor who had proposed a scheme of six weeks of dating and then  _ marriage _ . Oh wait, yes, it was.

Also, he looked good.  _ Really good.  _ She’d always known that. Except that now she was preoccupied with it in a way she’d always managed to shove into the box in her mind that contained other things she had decided she was not going to have. 

And now she might. Have him, that is. She just might. 

But she  _ had _ always thought he was handsome. He did not disappoint today, dressed down in a green sweater that complimented his skin tone, and dark jeans.

She hadn’t had sex in so long. And she’d never had sex with someone like him. She didn’t even want someone like him. She never spent much time looking. But his proposal had opened the floodgates in her mind to all the possibilities she shut down since she was barely an adult. She snapped herself back to the present. This was ridiculous.

She was dressed similarly to him, jeans, her cutest warm boots and a sweater. Today’s outing wasn’t the holiday party, after all. She realized they’d seen each other dressed up for his mother’s event more often than dressed down.

Their first date wasn’t even a fancy date night.

Ben had suggested they walk the city’s lights before they were taken down for the new year, after grabbing a late lunch at the food trucks that lined the city streets.

It was perfect, actually. 

The walking eased her nerves and let the conversation flow freely, and she was grateful for it.

But one question had been on the tip of her tongue the entire afternoon. Every time the conversation lulled, it was there, ready to attack. They talked about books, and pets, and his family, and her work and his work.

They made their way back to where he’d parked at the edge of downtown on a side street, the air getting chillier as the day inched towards the end, the way her mind inched towards the question.

Finally she blurted it out.

“Why do you want to be married?”

For two people who were dating as a means to an end towards marriage in an even more blatant way than most, they hadn’t said a thing about marriage, commitment, dating or anything romantic. She couldn’t tell if he was as preoccupied with those things as she was, her mind running a mile a minute in the background.

She continued before he could even make a face at the change in subject with her disjointed thoughts.

“I never got chocolate on valentine’s. I never went to a school dance. You don’t have to romance me. I’ve never even really had much romance. I guess I never inspired it in anybody.”

“So, no three foot tall teddy bears for you?”

She laughed.

“No. I’ve managed without this far. But I think that gave me a healthy idea about what a relationship is. And I know you are going to roll your eyes, but look at your parents... I don't know about when they were young, but cheesy romance certainly isn't what kept them going all these years. Though I did think it was sweet when she’d get flowers on her birthday. I don’t remember seeing anything else on other occasions, and they seem happy.”

Neither he nor she was sure if she was trying to convince herself that romance didn’t matter or if she really felt that way. Probably a little bit of both.

He debated telling her his next thought.

“It’s true, my parents aren’t romantics. I don't think my mom cared too much about flowers and the like, but uh… those weren’t from my dad. The birthday flowers. He never thinks of those things. I’m the one that sends her flowers on her birthday, actually.”

The surprise was evident on Rey’s face.

“Now maybe  _ you _ are going to roll your eyes, but I actually think a little romance is nice, and my parents could have used more of it. I’m not sure either one of them is the most thoughtful. I guess it works for them. I kinda don’t want to plan any idea of marriage around them.”

“But they’ve been together for decades,” Rey mused.

“Not all of them happy,” he responded quietly.

Rey sat down against a park bench near where they’d parked, thoughtful as they’d slowed their pace as they neared.

“I don’t think being consistently happy is a realistic goal, is it? Shouldn’t people shoot for happy more often than unhappy?”

Ben considered, joining her on the bench.

“So how long have you been protecting yourself by shooting for surviving well enough instead of thriving?”

She scoffed. Yikes. Ouch. 

“Maybe I don’t  _ need  _ romantic love to be happy. I’m happy with what I’ve built for my life, just me, as it has been.”

He didn’t want to go so far as to insult her.

“That’s fair. Truly, it is. But what percentage of happiness is good enough for two people? 90% 55%? My parents were somewhere between those two.”

“And they are a lovely couple.”

“But even when you are unhappy because life throws things at you, you can appreciate each other. That’s more of what I’m talking about. They could have been happier if they didn’t take each other for granted so often.”

The emotions flitted across her face, and Ben found himself absorbed in her expressions. He found himself falling for her, more than he ever had before. And it was just the first ‘real’ date.

Ever pragmatic, Rey responded.

“Oh. Okay. Fair enough. So if we do this thing. If we get married… we will what? Never stop telling each other we appreciate the other? Even when we are mad?”

“Well, yeah. I think so. Isn’t that the point of all of it? To go through things with someone, not just near them, and not alone?”

“That’s actually… really beautiful, Ben.”

The conversation unsettled her, but she was okay with that.

Later, when he dropped her off, he walked her to the door like some cheesy movie, and kissed her gently, if a bit too shyly for Rey’s taste. Her heart raced, and then stopped all together when he pulled back, looking extremely kissable and pouty and intense. And she could tell he was getting ready to say goodnight.

She pulled on his hand, the one that had rested on her hip just seconds earlier.

“Do you want to come in? Figure out all the ways we might be compatible?”

A look passed on his face, too fast to decipher.

And then he seemed… nervous.

He swallowed. 

“About that. Uh, I was thinking we shouldn’t have sex until Valentine’s Day, either.”

_ “What?”  _ Rey heard the world screech to a halt in her head.

She was too shocked to laugh.

“Is this some kind of weird prudish thing you failed to mention?”

“No, no, it definitely is not. I just thought… maybe it’d be better if we wait and keep getting to know each other.”

He kicked at the ground, looking down.

“You know, since the stakes are so high. The way we set this thing up.”

Rey smacked her forehead with her palm.

“You have  _ got _ to be kidding me.”

“Just hear me out.” His voice was even. Patient.

“I can’t believe you even gave this thought.”

“Trust me, Rey. I’ve given much thought to the idea of having sex with  _ you _ for far longer than was probably appropriate.”

“Oh. Okay, then. Let’s go do it.”

He groaned, and pulled her into him, bending down because of the height difference to whisper against her hair against her temple.

“I’d love nothing more. I promise. I just thought… if we decide this was a terrible idea, it’d be better we stayed friends after. The less… experience we have together… the less awkward and painful it will be when and if we decide not to go forward.”

She stepped back, missing his nearness, and annoyed. But also simply bemused.

“Fine. You keep overthinking and talking like some type of philosopher, which is pretty on brand for you, and  _ I _ will go inside and continue to be deprived, and possibly rummage through my bedside table later thinking about the night we could have had.”

And she left him on the doorstep after a quick peck on his cheek.

**Author's Note:**

> This was so silly, haha. Maybe a part 2 for Valentine's Day? idk.


End file.
